Requiem for a lazy blogger

Yup, I'm still yet to be cured of this slacker blogging syndrome. I was trying to pin down the reason this week and thought that it might be the fact that I've seen way too many disappointments this month, films that aren't exactly inspiring me to write. That doesn't mean I haven't seen some good ones, but the stud:dud ratio was clearly at an all-time low in February-March, so come with me as I take you on a tour of the hits and misses I've seen lately.

Biggest Dud: 'Creepshow 2'
My God this one was bad, and I actually had some modest expectations for it. I remember seeing the previews for it as a kid and always was intrigued by the potential of the vignette The Raft, which is the main reason I finally watched it. Based on three of Stephen King's short stories, Creepshow 2 also included George A. Romero as director. So there's definitely some potential here, which is subsequently ruined by the curious directing decision to play the whole movie slightly sarcastically, with a half-smirk to inject some element of comedy into all three stories. While it might have looked good on paper, the laughs are never there and subsequently, neither is the horror.

Making matters worse is the awful animated segments that preclude each of the stories. We begin as some sort of Cryptkeeper dude drops of the latest issue of Creepshow at a comic book store, where it is picked up by some slimey kid. Through the magic of animation that reaches previously unheard of lows, we see the kid's adventures with the comic in between readings and are introduced to the Cryptkeeper's generic castle as he introduces each story. Before the previously mentioned Raft story, we get a worthless vignette called 'Chief Wood'nhead' about a wooden indian who sits in front of George Kennedy's store, until one night when some hoods rob the place and he goes on a killing spree. It is devoid of any fright, comedy or entertainment value. Luckily after it was finally over I got to see the reason I even popped in this atrocity (which regularly sells for $5, wonder why): The Raft.

The story is vintage King: three teens on a raft haunted by a strange creature in the water that slowly kills them. The thing in the lake resembles a floating oil spot and can reach up through the cracks in the raft and kill them. This is a good premise, but the whole segment is ruined by more awful direction. When the first teen is sucked in and horribly killed, her friends react more like she dropped a glass of milk. It could have been played out like Cujo, which has a similar plot, but instead plays out like a bad Amazing Stories episode. In the end, 'Creepshow 2' was so disappointing I couldn't even bear to watch the final vignette (some trash about a woman and a zombie hitch hiker).

Biggest Hit: 'Elephant'
After watching Gus Van Sant's masterful Elephant, I couldn't believe there isn't more hype about it. 'Elephant' is one of the most original and unique movies I've ever seen. Most will dismiss it when they hear it's about a Columbine-style high school massacre, but it's more of an experimental film about life than anything. Using a voyeuristic lens and toying with the chronology of a day at a generic high school, Van Sant leads us through characters we get to know deeply, while never succumbing to overly expository dialogue. One of the characters, Carrie, has extensive screen time, but maybe two lines. Finally, she is given a quick and emotionless death just like the others, showing what little concern the teen killers had for their victims as they probably knew her just as we did: a face in the hallway.

Van Sant uses extremely long shots from a lens that routinely drifts away from characters and into other conversations like it was some ghost wandering through the school. The chronology Van Sant uses is creative, as in one scene we see three characters pass by each other in the hall and eventually see through each of their paths how they got to that intersection. At no point until that deja vu shot was it apparent that we were watching a flashback. The killers themselves are not portrayed as hell-bent Satanic kids, but as a couple of punks who anyone would know. Both know they are going to die and that they will kill many of their classmates, but never seem overly excited about their prospects. The only real emotion any of them show is when one is walking the halls and is frustrated that most of the students have already fled the building.

Van Sant makes it a point to show that he has no answers, just like anyone else, for the ghastly phenomenon of high school shootings. Using a controversial and unsexy topic, Van Sant created a very simple movie that creates a powerful message by being just that.

Biggest surprise: 'High Anxiety'
I was surprised by Mel Brooks' tribute to Alfred Hitchcock not in how much I liked it, but just as how it is not your typical Brooks comedy. He's at his always-zany, but it's not exactly overflowing with jokes like Blazing Saddles or Young Frankenstein or as daring as Silent Movie. And most of all, it's not really a parody, but as the opening prologue says: a tribute. If you're not familiar with Hitchcock, this might not be for you, as you won't catch the note-perfect takes on his scenes, or jokes like Brooks' character checking into a hotel as Mr. McGuffin. It's not the funniest Brooks comedy, but it just feels so right, such as the setup for the best joke in the movie: Brooks repeatedly asks for a newspaper from a bellhop, who finally enters Brooks' room while he's taking a shower and 'stabs' him with the newspaper, leading to the exact shot from 'Psycho' where we see black ink (the same color the blood in Hitchcock's black and white movie was) swirling down the drain.

Other misses:
Rio Grande
As the closing movie in John Ford's 'Cavalry Trilogy,' I really wanted to like Rio Grande, but it never seemed to capture the lively spirit that Fort Apache and She Wore a Yellow Ribbon did so well. Sure, John Wayne and Maureen O'Hara are in it and Victor McClaglen plays Victor McClaglen again, but the pieces never seem to come together as well as they did in the other two. Hurting its cause is that Lt. Col. Yorke isn't the best kind of character for Wayne. It's essentially the same character Henry Fonda played so well in 'Fort Apache,' whereas Wayne was always at his best when playing men with a slightly lighter and synical side, not a stone cold disciplinarian as Yorke is.

The Devil's Rejects
This wasn't so much a disappointment, as it was entertaining, but it seemed like it should have been better. The sequel to Rob Zombie's tremendous House of 1000 Corpses (which will be even better when a director's cut is finally released), The Devil's Rejects seems more like made-for-TV spinoff of a once-popular series. We get the best characters from 'House' back and go with them on more of their adventures, but it always seems like it's a 109-minute movie made with a 45-minute story. There are subplots and inflated scenes everywhere that seemingly do nothing to better the movie than to up the running time. And in that running time we never really get that good a glimpse at Captain Spaulding & Co. We're with them the whole time but never get the sense that we know them, or find out much more about them than we did in the original.

The Haunting (1963)
Again, a good movie but it never once lived up to its hype as a genuinely scary film. I watched it at night and never found it even remotely creepy. I wouldn't sayI'm immune to scares, as I am quick to give a movie credit for having genuine chills, but it may be a case of simply becoming desensitized to the 'what's that sound' kind of scare that this movie apparently makes its living on. That's not to say 'The Haunting' is not entertaining, as its use of brilliant setpieces (the towering spiral staircase -- wow!) and lighting make for plenty of eye candy, but the lack of scares makes this movie truly drag at times.

Another end-all box set

Us Western fans are getting spoiled again. If you were floored by the long-overdue Peckinpah set, feast your eyes on this. On June 6, Warner is set to release the John Ford-John Wayne Collection. The ten disc (!) set is headlined by two heavyweights: an Ultimate Collector's Edition of The Searchers (2006 representing the film's 50th anniversary) and a two-disc set of Stagecoach. 'The Searchers' alone will retail for $35 since it will contain a load of goodies including a 36-page booklet, a reproduction of the original comic book, behind the scenes photos and even a mail-in one-sheet poster. In addition to these two blockbusters, the set will come with Fort Apache, The Wings of Eagles, The Long Voyage Home, She Wore a Yellow Ribbon, They Were Expendable and 3 Godfathers. How much for this treasure chest? How does $80 sound?!?

The new discs of 'The Searchers' and 'Stagecoach' will retail for near $50 alone, and for another $30 you can six more classics, with nary a dud among them? Too good to be true. Actually my only quibble is that it does not contain Rio Grande, the finale to Ford's 'Cavalry Trilogy' that also includes 'Fort Apache' and 'She Wore a Yellow Ribbon.'

To understand what a great release this is, compare it to Universal's recent Alfred Hitchcock set, which contains 14 films at a bargain price, but gives us discs of movies many of us already had, in many cases hardly improving upon the original. The Ford-Wayne set presents two exhaustive special editions and the best examples of the featured genre (no 'Torn Curtain,' 'Topaz' or 'Frenzy' which bogged down the Hitchcock set). Also, keep in mind that $80 is the MSRP for the set, which means Amazon will probably sell it for $65 or $70!

Though 'Stagecoach' and 'The Searchers' are what will really sell this set, I can't wait to finally have 'Fort Apache' on my shelf, which is my favorite Ford-Wayne film. A meaningful and original tale of military ethics with a cast featuring Henry Fonda, Shirley Temple (with one of the best character names ever -- Philadelphia Thursday), Ward Bond and even a 'hell yeah!' role by the one and only Victor McLaglen help push 'Fort Apache' into the cinematic stratosphere. The most memorable scene in the movie is Wayne's closing monologue, which is regarded by some as his finest moment.

So now that Western fans can check Peckinpah and now Ford off their DVD wish lists, when can we finally get special editions of Leone's For a Few Dollars More, A Fistful of Dollars and Duck, You Sucker that we have long been promised?

Your basic Oscar prediction post

Yeah, I've been slacking off lately in terms of posting, but that's neither here nor over there because the Oscars are coming up this Sunday. You won't find all the categories here (does anyone have a preference for 'Best Sound Mixing'?), but you will find plenty of second-guessing and semi-informed opinions.


Actress in a supporting role
Nominees: Amy Adams, Junebug; Catherine Keener, Capote; Frances McDormand, North Country; Rachel Weisz, The Constant Gardener; Michelle Williams, Brokeback Mountain

This is probably the least glamorous of all the major categories this year. Nobody saw 'Junebug,' there's little remaining buzz over 'North Country' and Philip Seymour Hoffman is who everyone remembers from 'The Constant Gardener.' I see it as a two-person race between Weisz and Williams. Both are also in the I-Can't-Believe-Charlize Theron-Is-Actually-Nominated! category, since the two actresses have had a fairly dubious career up until this point (Weisz in both 'Mummy' movies; Williams was in 'Dick' and even starred as Wilson's girlfriend in an episode of 'Home Improvement'). But Williams was the main reason 'Brokeback Mountain' was pushed from a pretty good movie into a favorite for Best Picture.
Who I want to win: Williams
Who will win: Williams

Actor in a supporting role
Nominees: George Clooney, Syriana; Matt Dillon, Crash; Paul Giamatti, Cinderella Man; Jake Gyllenhall, Brokeback Mountain; William Hurt, A History of Violence

Wow, what a lineup. Can't remember the last time this category was so packed with stars. A few quibbles: how did Gyllenhall find his way onto this list when his role in 'Brokeback' was at least equal to Heath Ledger's, who is nominated for Best Actor? And Hurt was good in 'A History of Violence,' but he was only in one scene and had maybe 15 minutes of screen time, how does he get the nod over someone like Mickey Rourke in 'Sin City'? I think this is Dillon's to lose, since 'Crash' has all the hype and he is the lone acting nominee from it, but it wouldn't surprise me at all to see Giamatti come away with it since many felt he was robbed for not winning for 'Sideways.' I won't be let down with any of these choices, but will root for Hurt as an underdog that will give attention to a film that should have been nominated for Best Picture.
Who I want to win: Hurt
Who will win: Dillon

Actress in a leading role:
Nominees: Judi Dench, Mrs. Henderson Presents; Felicity Huffman, Transamerica; Keira Knightley, Pride & Prejudice; Charlize Theron, North Country; Reese Witherspoon, Walk the Line

I'm going to throw out Theron and Knightley immediately, since the memory of Theron winning the award is still fresh and classic roles (like Knightley's) rarely win. I can see Dench winning, as she is an easy person to vote for, but I don't see her or Huffman overcoming the momentum that Witherspoon still has with Walk the Line. The first thing people talked about with the movie was Witherspoon's performance, which was much more complicated and driving than Joaquin Phoenix's. It will help her that there's really no other homeruns in this group. Witherspoon plum deserves the award, as even taking on the role of June Carter-Cash was a brave move for her, since she had never had a role like that before.
Who I want to win: Witherspoon
Who will win: Witherspoon

Actor in a leading role
Nominees: Philip Seymour Hoffman, Capote; Terrence Howard, Hustle & Flow; Heath Ledger, Brokeback Mountain; Joaquin Phoenix, Walk the Line; David Strathain, Good Night, and Good Luck

For anyone who has seen 'Hustle & Flow,' you know that Terrence Howard absolutely deserves this award, and you will also know that he will not win it. The movie itself has so little buzz, and it was nominated for no other awards, that it's a given, and a shame, that Howard will not win. And it's too bad, because Howard perfected a completely original and complicated character who carried an inspired movie from beginning to end. I see this as another two-person race between Hoffman and Ledger, as Phoenix's performance was somewhat overrated and nobody knows who the hell Strathain is. While Ledger's performance is easily second-best to Howard this year in my book, Hoffman is an actor who many people will vote for partly because of his many great past roles.
Who I want to win: Howard
Who will win: Hoffman

Director/Best Picture
Nominees: Brokeback Mountain, Capote, Crash, Good Night, and Good luck, Munich

This is one of the few years recently where the Best Director nominees are identical to those in Best Picture, so I combined them. I have two thoughts here: Ang Lee should win for Best Director and 'Crash' is the weakest link of the Best Picture noms. Watching 'Brokeback,' it's clear how tenuous a picture this was, how if it was mishandled in any way, its significance would be lost. The subject of Gay Cowboys in Love seems like it would walk the line between satire and fetish, but instead it's one of the best interpretations of forbidden love. Whereas 'Brokeback' is original and of rare quality, the hype 'Crash' has enjoyed is mostly because it has dared to touch on racism. It is a commendable subject, but it's another thing to present it in the most heavy-handed and predictable way possible. The Matt Dillon rescue scene and the ending between Ludacris and Terrence Howard are the most egregious offenders, as both scenes come off as completely unbelievable. We've also seen the Sandra Bullock character before in tons of movies, a person (usually a woman) who stereotypes a class/race, but by the end must change her views. I wasn't impressed at all, and I saw it when it first came out before all the hype. Of all these candidates, I thought 'Brokeback' was the best, but feel that 'Capote' will win because I have the feeling that the voters will give this award back to an artsy, small-budget film, unlike past years.
Who I want to win: Brokeback Mountain
Who will win: Capote

Does the world really need 14 Superman discs?

In the latest chapter of the ongoing trend of releasing big DVD sets to promote new movies, Warner Bros. will apparently sell a Superman box set to end all box sets, weighing in at a mammoth 14 discs. Overkill? Probably. Most of the hype surrounding this set will focus on the 'Richard Donner Cut' of Superman II, and you can read about what might be in that version in this exhaustive article about the upcoming set. Here's the long and mostly short of it: the main reason Superman: The Movie took nearly two years to complete is that the plan was for Donner to shoot the movie and its sequel simultaneously. Finally, after Donner had shot about 75 percent of the sequel, producers told him to wrap it up and they would finish shooting on the sequel after Superman had raked in the dough.

That all seemed fine and dandy, but Donner ended up parting ways with the franchise after shooting the original Superman, so Richard Lester was brought in to finish up the sequel, and also Superman III. Lester was best known as the director of most of The Beatles' movies and also two different Three Musketeers films (he would direct a third, The Return of the Musketeers, in 1989, starring who else but C. Thomas Howell as Raul). Doesn't this sound like the guy you want at the helm of a major special effects franchise?

Anyway, even though Donner had shot a lot of footage for the sequel, most of it was junked, including all the scenes involving Marlon Brando as Superman's father Jor-El. This new version will hopefully include those scenes, as well as an infamous scene previously only seen in the television cut. I am one of the few people to attempt to watch Superman II on television and still have fond memories of this disturbing scene, here's a synopsis:

After the three baddies escape from the Phantom Zone, you would expect them to terrorize the world, but their first stop is a small town in Texas. After humiliating the local law enforcement, a young boy jumps on a horse and rides away for help. The female baddy, Ursa, grabs a siren off a police car, hurls it some 400 yards and kills the boy, setting up this exchange between Ursa and the boy's mother:

'But he was just a boy!'
'Who will never become a man'

Wowie!

Well back to the lecture at hand, this is a completely needless attempt by Warner to convince the public that the Superman series was actually memorable. Even with Donner's new footage, the sequel will still only be an average movie. If you don't believe me, here's an example of the consistently horrid dialogue:

After the three baddys kill some astronauts on the moon . . . one astronaut said 'It's a girl,' leading to this awesome exchange at mission control:
SCIENTIST1: What's a 'curl'?
SCIENTIST2: Isn't that what the old Canaveral guys used to call a comet with an East-West trajectory?
SCIENTIST1: How should I know? I was back in high school in those days.

Hoho!

Superman III is literally one of the worst movies you will ever see. Not only does it NOT star Gene Hackman, but we finally get to see what happens when Superman faces off against an equally supercomputer designed by Richard Pryor. 'Superman III' is at least entertaining in how bad it is. When Pryor and gang try and kill the Man of Steel with kryptonite laced with tobacco, he is turned into Bad Superman, who wastes no time in getting drunk (leading to an epic scene on him in a bar where he starts breaking things by flicking peanuts, much to the dismay of onlookers) and straightening the Leaning Tower of Pisa. We also get a scene of Pryor skiing down the side of a building (we told you he's CRAZY!).


Superman IV: The Quest for Peace is a minor upgrade, if only because we get Lex Luthor back and a new villain (Nuclear Man -- what else?). Sidney J. Furie was a natural choice for director, I mean he had just overseen Iron Eagle. Among many questionable scenes in this movie is the one where Superman unveils his previously unused 'brick action' power. After Nuclear Man destroys the Great Wall of China, Superman stares intently at the ruins and magically rebuilds it in a few seconds. Did Jor-El tell him about the 'brick action' power during his trip to Earth? ('This is another little thing you can do, if a brick house or church is knocked down and you don't have time to rebuild it on your own . . . ')

So enough about the movies, what exactly are they going to find to fill 14 discs? One rumor is that Warner will include the unimaginable horror that is Supergirl. Okay, but that's still only five movies. Assuming Warner can dig up enough trash extras to warrant two discs for each movie, we're still four short. Another question is how much will this very bad boy cost? A comparable set, the Alien Quadrilogy retails for $80 for only eigh discs. It's possible that the Superman set could get into the $150 range.

Finally, it appears that this mammoth set will be bested by the upcoming Planet of the Apes: Ultimate DVD Collection set. Also coming in at 14 discs, this completely unwanted set will contain all five movies, the entire television series, the entire animated series and a new two-disc set of Tim Burton's Planet of the Apes.

Seven Days of Sam Peckinpah, Part 2

'Am I still gonna get paid?'
Day 4: 'Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia'

This movie is often described as Peckinpah's most personal film, so it comes as no surprise that Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia is a grating, unforgettable trip through the deepest depths of desperation and false hope. 'Alfredo Garcia' was the lone 'controversial' film by Peckinpah that had no studio interference, and it was also the director's last great film. After 'Alfredo Garcia' he would essentially become a director-for-hire, taking on projects such as Convoy and The Osterman Weekend before his death in 1984.

So as the last great Peckinpah film, it is so fitting that 'Alfredo Garcia' is also the first starring role for Warren Oates, who made a career out of small, but entertaining roles, primarily in Westerns. Oates was a perfect cast, because his character of Bennie is a person who was always in the background, but who has one chance (however minute) to pull himself out of a lifetime rut. Bennie, an American banished to Mexico, is spending another night as a worthless piano player in a bar where no one bats an eye when a hooker is punched to the floor. But on this fateful night, he hears news that a Mexican general is offering a sizeable bounty for the head of one Alfredo Garcia. Bennie takes interest in this because he knows Garcia is already dead.

To get the bounty, Bennie will have to enlist the help of his hooker girlfriend (who was once involved with Garcia) and journey into the darkest locations of Mexico before digging up a corpse and coming away with its head. It is a risky and unsettling proposition, but also one Bennie knows he can't turn down, because this is his one chance to come out on top. Oates is marvelous playing a character who will reach the pinnacle of hope and experience love for the first time in his life, before jarringly plunging into the lowest possible depth and emerging with nothing save for a craving for his own death.

With 'Alfredo Garcia,' Peckinpah gives us an emotional punch to the gut. The movie turns so unexpectedly from an underdog story into a what-could-possibly-come-next descent into the absolute worst of ourselves. The characters are so perfectly established, that when Bennie wakes up next to Garcia's grave to find out the only thing in the world he cared about more than that awful head was taken away from him, the anger and grief feels almost too real.

Peckinpah again uses his familiar technique of demoralizing male characters by showing their companion taken by another man. But in 'Alfredo Garcia' it is used in the most heartbreaking fashion, when the biker played by Kris Kristofferson essentially says he's going to rape Bennie's girlfriend, our hero tries to intervene only to be told to go away because she's 'been here before.' This leads to Bennie killing both bikers, as he begins to realize the violence he is capable of and what he is willing to do to reach his goal.

By the end, the prize is in sight for Bennie, but he has lost everything else and knows it does not matter a bit. When he looks into the eyes of the person who started this backbreaking fall for him, Bennie realizes he has fallen so far that the only way out is through the barrel of a gun, which is the last visual before the credits rise.

Best scene: Bennie gets a little help from his friends (and their machine gun) when the going gets iffy on the road.
Best line: 'I've been no place I wanna go back to, that's for sure' --Bennie
Best Peckinpah moment: El Jefe's daughter telling Bennie to kill him.

'It feels like ... times have changed'
Day 5: 'Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid'

With Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid, Peckinpah was presented for the first time in his career with material that had been done before. Hollywood had produced numerous tales of the former lawless friends who were now at odds with each other, and many of them focused on the infamous Billy the Kid. If Peckinpah was going to make a film on a familiar story, then you know he was going to do it different, and his way. Peckinpah's vision of the old Western tale is told more from the angle of Garrett, and is ultimately light on story but heavy on all the elements that make his movies great.

As the movie opens, we are introduced to Billy and Garrett and quickly learn that they are old friends. Garrett informs Billy that he has short time to get out of town, since Garrett will soon be the area's sheriff. Weeks later, after arresting his friend, Billy escapes from jail and leads Garrett on a long chase through Mexico that takes up the rest of the movie. Where this movie loses most viewers is after Billy escapes from jail, as there is little narrative as Billy eludes his friend. Garrett doesn't seem all that rushed to capture his fugitive and Billy doesn't seem to be trying to hard to escape the law. The plot is weak compared to other Peckinpah greats, but it is still an entertaining show, as it is helped by one of the greatest casts for any Western.

What keeps 'Billy' going is the casting of Kris Kristofferson and James Coburn in the title roles. Peckinpah portrays Billy as an anti-authority free spirit capable of harsh violence, Kristofferson fits this role perfectly, looking the part of a 19th century hippy. Coburn is able to be his hard-ass self in the role of Garrett, who at heart is still every bit the bandit as Billy. Both actors have two of the most memorable voices in cinema, and their rare conversations create some sort of testosterone-twanged harmony. The casting of Bob Dylan is questionable, but he does well with what little material he has and of course contributed the outstanding soundtrack.

Dylan's music is the driving force behind one of the movie's best scenes. As Garrett hunts down some of Billy's comrades with a newly deputized old friend and his wife, the opening chords of 'Knocking on Heaven's Door' begins playing softly. This happens just as Baker, the lawman accompanying Garrett, is shot in the gut and realizes he's about to die. Baker slowly starts walking toward a river when his wife notices and runs after him. Just as his wife sees his wound, Dylan sings the iconic first line of the song, 'Mama take this badge from me . . .' A scene earlier, Baker asked 'Mama' for his badge so they could help Garrett. It's a small, but heartbreaking and just plain perfect scene.

The new DVD of 'Billy' offers two versions, the 'preview version' which is the longer cut, and a new cut of the film from 2005 done by those who worked with Peckinpah and were familiar with what he wanted. The new version is tighter and moves a couple of scenes around as well as other differences (i.e. in the preview version, we never hear Dylan's lyrics in the above scene). That the newer version is able to present a more fluid movie by rearranging scenes illustrates the frustration many have with this movie. It has little structure and we appear to follow the title characters from one isolated scene to another. As the film progresses, its pretension increases, climaxing with an unfulfililng ending that tries to be overly relevant. 'Billy' is an entertaining Western spectacle, but lacks the deeper meaning of Peckinpah's other greats.

Best scene: Billy's jail escape is raw, brutal and wild fun.
Best line: 'Won't some of you people get him up off the ground and into it?' --Garrett
Best Peckinpah moment: Billy convinces his friend during a shootout that since he already has mortal wounds, why not help us out and go out shooting?

'If you have trouble [spelling] "Cable," wait until you get to "Hogue"'
Day 6: 'The Ballad of Cable Hogue'

The Ballad of Cable Hogue is unlike any other Peckinpah movie, which pretty much makes it unlike any other movie, period. This does not mean it is a truly great film, but it is wonderfully quirky and unique, with a typically excellent Peckinpah cast. 'Cable Hogue' is a simple revenge tale sprinkled in with romance and some occasional goofball comedy. Most of this movie has aged very poorly, as you will likely groan when scenes have characters running away in double time, Benny Hill-style.

A soft-hearted drifter double-crossed and left for dead by his 'friends,' Cable is in the desert with no horse, water and presumably -- hope. That's until his unlikely discovery of a spring not too far from the road. With the help of a girl-crazy preacher who comes along the road, Hogue fixes up a glorified roadhouse that serves the occasional passerby. While in town securing the few acres he needs, Hogue takes a fancy to a prostitute named Hildy, but doesn't bother to pay for her services. Before being chased out of town, Hogue convinces a stage company to take a chance on him and give him funds for his roadhouse. Soon, Hogue is a fairly reputable businessman, and it's not too long before Hildy starts to warm up to him again.

What keeps 'Cable Hogue' going is the electric performance from Jason Robards as the title character. In keeping with Peckinpah's usual themes, Hogue is a good guy nearing the end of his life before realizing what he is capable of. While he softens up a bit as he succeeds as a businessman, Hogue knows that someday his former friends will be coming along that road and he has some payback for them.

There is little violence, and the comedy rarely works, so what makes this a good movie? Like all Peckinpah films, the characters are believable and rarely fail to entertain. The interaction between Hogue, Hildy and their preacher friend Josh is where the film is at its best. 'Cable Hogue' starts going downhill at the end, when Peckinpah tries to cram more meaning into the movie than it really needs. His familiar theme of the end of the West comes out at the end, and it seems unneeded. 'Cable Hogue' is still a fun movie, but has less relevance and has aged worse than any of Peckinpah's other Westerns.

Best scene: Hogue scares the wits out of his enemies by baiting them into a hole where they find snakes thrown on them.
Best line: 'Since I cannot rouse Heaven, I intend to raise Hell' -- Josh
Best Peckinpah moment: Hogue sharing a bottle of whiskey with the drivers of the stagecoach, ala 'The Wild Bunch.'

'The day of the 49er is gone'
Day 7: 'Ride the High Country'

I conclude this Peckinpah marathon with his first real movie, which showed Hollywood what he could do even with the most modest of budgets and expectations. Shot in only 26 days and with two of the genres foremost stalwarts, Ride the High Country is a timeless tale of morals, friendship and aging, which would go on to be popular themes in all of Peckinpah's greats.

Longtime friends Steve Judd and Gil Westrum find themselves on opposite ends of the tracks now. Gil is an entertainer, masquerading as a sharp shooter named 'The Oregon Kid,' while Steve was once a U.S. Marshal, but is now trying to prove he can still cut as a lawman even as he grows old. Together, they take on a job of transporting a gold shipment through dangerous territory. Gil brings with him his young protege Heck and they even pick up a young woman who is going their way to be married.

'Ride the High Country' was greenlighted as another simple Western, but Peckinpah made it something much more, and it is still regarded as one of the genre's best. All of Peckinpah's Westerns show the end of the cowboy days, and this is the most literal use of that theme, as stars Joel McCrea and Randolph Scott were both veteran Western actors looking to end their acting days on a high note.

On their way to the gold town, Gil and Steve prove to their young companions that they can more than handle their own on the dangerous trail. And when it is clear that Elsa is in over her head with her marriage, the two take it upon themselves to set things right. Little did Elsa know that by marrying one of the infamous Hammond brothers, she was in essence marrying the whole gang. Essentially raped on her wedding night, Gil and Steve take things into their own hands, even though they don't have to.

Before they get back home, they will take on the Hammond brothers gang and Gil will be forced to make a choice of going forward with his plan (stealing the gold for himself and Heck) or being loyal to his friend. By the end, we are left with one of the most touching death scenes of all time and a glimpse into the early successes of a filmmaker who would use this film as his jumping-off point. The values touched on in 'Ride the High Country' are summed up in the best line of the film, and perhaps any Peckinpah movie:
Heck: My father says there's only right and wrong - good and evil. Nothing in between. It isn't that simple, is it?
Steve: No, it isn't. It should be, but it isn't

Best scene: The raucus gold community celebrates Elsa's wedding the only way they can
Best line: See above
Best Peckinpah moment: In a shootout with the Hammond brothers, Gil and Steve show they haven't missed a beat.

Closing thoughts: The idea for this marathon came from the new Peckinpah box set, and it does not disappoint. All four movies (as well as other Peckinpah DVDs, such as 'Straw Dogs,' 'Alfredo Garcia' and 'Junior Bonner') have excellent commentaries from four men who knew the director best. The new version of 'Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid' actually improves on the original movie and 'The Wild Bunch' is loaded with extras (not that I would know, my second disc is defective and I'll have to send the whole set back to get a replacement disc). What got me excited to write these two posts is that Peckinpah is not only one of my favorite directors but also one of the most interesting persons in all of cinema. He was a tortured soul and was able to make several great movies before his death. Even though a few of the films touched on here ('Major Dundee,' 'The Ballad of Cable Hogue') do not measure up to the others, they are still entertaining and worthy of seeing.

Seven Days of Sam Peckinpah, Part 1

I don't think I had ever been more excited about a DVD than when I heard about Sam Peckinpah's Legendary Westerns Collection. This box set would diagnose three DVD itches I was ailing from: a more respectable release for The Wild Bunch, and actually getting Peckinpah masterpieces Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid and The Ballad of Cable Hogue on DVD. The fact that another Peckinpah fave of mine, Ride the High Country in the box set and package it all for around $40 got me excited. But when I heard that we would be getting a two-disc 'Wild Bunch' packed full of extras, two versions of Billy the Kid and commentaries on each movie from Peckinpah biographers, that's when I started to think it was all too good to be true.

Well I now know it's true because I got the box set in the mail last week, along with Peckinpah necessities Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia and Junior Bonner. This coincided with me finally getting the new extended version of Major Dundee from Blockbuster Online, thus setting the stage for Seven Days of Sam Peckinpah: a one week, two post event wherein I would finally get around to reviewing some of my all-time favorites.

'If they move ... kill 'em'
Day 1: The Wild Bunch
It's rare that you find a movie whose opening scene has so much tension or sheer 'you are in for one hell of a movie' bravado as 'The Wild Bunch.' The opening is just perfect, from Peckinpah's trademark freezeframe credits to the uneasy calm before the robbery turns into a bloodbath. It's a fitting introduction to a film which goes so outside the boundary of what a typical Western was and packs so much plot, characters and thrilling violence into its running time.

It's easy to see how 'The Wild Bunch' still has an influence over today's films. It was one of the first movies to use slow-motion photography in action scenes, as well as one of the first to utilize the more liberal censors of that era by painting each shootout with gratuitous amounts of blood. It would also set the stage for many more movies where pretty much all the characters are criminals, leading to calls that Hollywood is glorifying crime and violence.

But the gunfire and gore isn't what made 'The Wild Bunch' such a classic, this is a movie with a multi-layered plot and many well-developed characters. For me, 'Wild Bunch' starts to hit its groove when we see the first Pike Bishop-Deac Thornton flashback. We learn so much about both men in that short flashback, Bishop's quiet regrets of leaving Thornton in the lurch and Thornton's searing revenge for getting arrested while Bishop continued living the life of a criminal. The idea of former friends now on opposite sides of the law is one of the many themes repeated in Peckinpah's movies, as it was featured prominently in 'Ride the High Country,' 'Major Dundee' and of course 'Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid.'

All of Peckinpah's films feature the theme of growing old, but staying smart and strong. 'The Wild Bunch' is perhaps the most famous example of this, and I would say his best use of it, since all of the characters carry an air of desperation with them, as they know their time is running out. 'The Wild Bunch' was the first Peckinpah film to use a cuckold element as a device to show power. Angel is absolutely destroyed by watching his former flame ignore him and throw herself at Gen. Mapache, seemingly reveling in his feelings of shock and betrayal. Peckinpah would use scenes of women openly cheating on their partners later in 'Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid' and most prominently in The Getaway.

What helped undoubtedly helped 'The Wild Bunch' become such an undisputed classic was the underrated score by Jerry Fielding. The bristling, varied themes composed by Fielding pop up at just the right time and add extra punch and tension to scenes such as those preceding the final shootout
Best scene: Has to be the opening shootout, its controlled chaos rivals that of the movie's climax.
Best line: 'What I like and what I need are two different things!' -Thornton
Best Peckinpah moment: Thornton constantly abusing the thugs that are supposed to assist him. He's out of prison, but trying to catch Bishop and Co. is almost as bad when he's stuck with these 'gutter trash, chicken-stealing sons of bitches.'

'Tell him Junior sent ya'
Day 2: Junior Bonner
If your nickname is 'Bloody,' you can shed that image as a filmmaker real quick by making a rodeo movie. Yes, it is a rodeo movie set in modern times, but Peckinpah makes sure no one mistakes it for anything but a Western. 'Junior Bonner' doesn't have any shootouts and has few tense moments, but still manages to be a very entertaining film.

Like most of his films, Peckinpah surrounds his star (Steve McQueen) with his own troupe of well-known Western mainstays (though in this case, the Peckinpah Troupe is sparsely represented, with only Dub Taylor and Ben Johnson on hand). 'Junior Bonner' has a small, but well-rounded cast, and that seems to help the movie, since you know who everybody is. One thing that has always amused me is how McQueen is pretty much upstaged in the movie by Johnson, who plays his affable and flamboyant father.

Ace Bonner is a key figure in the movie, since Junior is as much awed by him as he is scared, because he can see himself becoming the mirror-image of him. At one point in time, the elder Bonner was a self-described rodeo celebrity, but is now barely known in his own town (which is quickly becoming unrecognizable, thanks to his other son, Curley). This sense of becoming forgotten is illustrated beautifully in two short moments (at Curley's new development and outside the rodeo) when Junior asks if someone has seen his father and both times he is answered with 'who?'

Junior doesn't much care about being a celebrity, but he does want to show his hometown what he can do at the rodeo before traveling to another small town who-cares competition. The most important thing in Junior's life is doing things his way, whether it's right (getting a second chance at the bull who beat him before) or wrong (punching out his brother in front of his family). Junior comes back to Preston, Ariz. finding his family's old house being razed to make way for a mobile home park built by his brother, his dad's in the hospital after driving drunk, his mom is happy to see him, but she (like everyone) want him to settle down and do something practical with his life.

The ending is predictable, but along the way we get amazing scenes, such as father and son riding off on the same horse in the middle of a beautiful parade to share a bottle of booze, the chaotic milk-a-cow competition and of course the barfight scene, which I wrote about before. In the end, 'Junior Bonner' has simplest of all Peckinpah stories, and you get the sense he wanted it that way, so as to avoid the studio meddling that plagued most of his efforts.
Best scene: Junior tricks an old friend into starting a bar fight so he can escape for a few minutes with his trophy girlfriend.
Best line: 'I'm working on my first million, you're still working on 8 seconds' -Curley
Best Peckinpah moment: Children watching in awe as Junior and other rodeo guys get pummeled in the dirt (violence amusing the young is seen in almost every Peckinpah film).
One last thing: Scarecrow Video, the biggest and best video store on the planet, put out an excellent book two years ago, at least I thought it was excellent until I read their synopsis of 'Junior Bonner:' 'His old friends welcome him immediately and press him to ride in the upcoming rodeo. His children are slower to accept him, and after dogged perseverance by Bonner, his wife comes around.'
Uh, what? First of all, the first thing he does when he gets into Preston is join the rodeo, no one had to convince him. But Junior definitely has no children or wife, at least not in the movie I saw. The only explanation I can think of is Scarecrow must have confused his two nephews and sister-in-law Ruth as his children and wife.

'Until the Apache is taken or destroyed'
Day 3: Major Dundee
All that I knew about 'Major Dundee' prior to this week were from reading DVD Savant's extremely indepth article regarding the trials Peckinpah faced in filming it. The story of how 'Major Dundee' was made is perhaps more famous than the movie itself, here's a quick synopsis: In 1964, Peckinpah's only major experience directing a mainstream studio film was 'Ride the High Country,' but he was nonetheless recruited for 'Major Dundee,' which Columbia had eyed as a historic, patriotic movie. Peckinpah had grander plans of a 160-minute epic, which Columbia did not want but Peckinpah went ahead with it, blowing his budget on filming in exotic Mexican locales. This led to Peckinpah being banned from the Columbia lot, where his movie was chopped down to under 2 hours. No one has ever seen the full version Peckinpah intended, until this year when an extended edition DVD was released with 12 additional minutes and re-cut scenes. It also had an entirely new score, replacing the amateurish, abrasive original music.

As a result of being chopped down so much, 'Major Dundee' was released in 1965 as a movie with a grand story and an all-star cast, but also a film that was very hard to follow . . . or enjoy. As such, it often gets the studio interference 'free pass' that other mangled epics such as Welles' The Magnificent Ambersons is afforded (you will note that 'Ambersons' is rated an '8' by IMDB users, a rating I think is about three points too high, but that's for another post).

Savant noted that Peckinpah's overly grand plans for 'Major Dundee' were probably due to his inexperience with dealing with studios and his desire to put himself on the same level as filmmakers such as David Lean and Howard Hawks, whose resumes were filled with such epics. What 'Major Dundee' ultimately became was a movie filled with the small details and memorable characters that made Peckinpah such a popular director, but these characters were caught in an abbreviated story with nothing all that interesting or significant to do.

'Major Dundee' is the story of the title character (Charlton Heston), a civil war union general relegated to overseeing a jail full of confederates. But when a band of Apaches slaughter troops and kidnap children, he takes their vengeance upon himself, even if he has to lead an army composed of mostly of confederate prisoners. It's a wonderful beginning, but the movie never really takes off, and there are only a couple of memorable scenes that stick out (the best being the climax, in which the remains of Dundee's army square off with a large French contingent in the Rio Grande, turning the river red with blood). One curious aspect that really bogs down 'Major Dundee' is that many of the key scenes are filmed (poorly) at night, leading to squinted eyes and the hopes that one of these troops brought a lantern or two.

It's interesting to imagine what 'Major Dundee' could have been in its full form, but it already seems too long at the restored 139 minutes. Another way to look at it its significance is how it changed Peckinpah as a director, would we have gotten 'The Wild Bunch' or 'Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia' without 'Major Dundee'?
Best scene: The aforementioned Rio Grande scene, which allegedly was even more drawn out and action packed in the full version.
Best line: 'I am *not* your uncle, you redneck peckerwood. And if you say one more word, you'll spend the rest of this campaign in chains.' -Dundee
Best Peckinpah moment: Capt. Tyreen (Richard Harris) shoots Hadley in the back before the Yanks can put him before a firing squad.

Stay tuned for Seven Days of Sam Peckinpah, Part 2!

New Arrivals at the DVD Panache Library

(EDITOR'S NOTE: Some of you may have wondered why there was no post last week, and frankly we're still searching for that answer too. Not to fear, in an effort to win back readers who are still on the fence, this week begins the DVD Panache Seven Days of Sam Peckinpah Marathon. This will be the basis of the next two weeks' posts, so bear with me because it is sure to be a semi-wild ride.)

The bags of letters (some not even written by me!) I have received since Christmas have had a consistent theme: did you blow all your hard-earned Christmas on DVDs or what? The answer to that is a firm yes, and if you shift your gaze to the right, you will notice that I have finally updated The DVD Panache Library to reflect these recent purchases.

The DVD I was most looking forward to for the past few months would have to be Sin City: Recut, Extended, Unrated, and I am pleased to report that this is everything you could ever hope for (and more!) in a Robert Rodriguez DVD. Rodriguez packs every possible goody in this two-disc pack, and even adds a few features you've never seen anywhere before. One of these creative features is a chance to watch the movie (albeit sped up about 800%) in its raw form, that is without any of the cool black and white backgrounds and effects added. It's amazing to see that this big of a movie could be filmed in such a small space.

Fans of the original graphic novels will be pleased to see that the only way to watch the new cut of Sin City is to watch each story on its own. This works especially well with That Yellow Bastard, which was bookended around The Big Fat Kill and The Hard Goodbye in the theatrical cut. Even better, Yellow Bastard gets the most new scenes of the three stories, so it's a drastically different experience than the one you saw in theaters. The best of the Yellow Bastard new scenes is that we finally get to see Aileen, Hardigan's wife, and why she left him. Unfortunately, the other two stories hardly get any new scenes. The Hard Goodbye gives us a scene with Marv's mom, but I think that was it. The Big Fat Kill only has one new scene, but thankfully it's the best of the bunch. Let's just say that if you're a Miho fan, skip right to the last scene.

And since it is a Rodriguez disc, you get another installment of his cooking school (breakfast tacos) and another session of his 10-minute film school. The latter is extremely informative and makes you wonder why no one thought of this filmmaking technique before, or for that matter how much it will be used in the future.

Finally, one of the first things you will notice about this set is just how handsome its packaging is. It looks awesome on your shelf, especially if it's right next to the previous Sin City DVD (I couldn't wait either).

But if the new Sin City DVD is my favorite new disc, the King Kong set can't be too far behind. The best part about the Kong set is the exhausting seven-part documentary, with a running time of over 120 minutes, which is a dream for any fan of the movie. This docu gives you everything from clips of the early adventure movies made by Merrian C. Cooper and Earnest Schoedsack to the few surviving clips of Creation, the almost-movie that was the primary inspiration behind Kong. But the very best and most heralded part of this documentary is the work of Peter Jackson and friends to restore the lost Spider Pit sequence, which was excised from the original cut and has never been found. Pretty much just for shits and giggles, Jackson and Co. spent weeks recreating this sequence with the same kind of technology that was available in 1933. The end result is expectedly hokey, but also genuinely terrifying in some parts.

The most surprising DVD I got was the Back to the Future Trilogy, which you can get at Amazon for $18. For that money, this three-pack is stuffed to the gills with extras, including excellent commentary tracks by two of its producers and all kinds of documentaries and interviews. Also, I had not ever watched the whole trilogy in sequence before, and you can really see how both of the sequels lack that youthful energy of the first one. The third one regains some of this, but the second movie remains a disappointment to me.

Finally, due in the mail today or tomorrow is, among others, The Wizard of Oz Three Disc Collector's Edition. It's good to see this classic get the epic treatment it deserves, as it appears this set is on par with The Lord of the Rings Extended Editions for how many extras are included. I'll post a review of the whole set if I ever get through it. This article gives a good idea of what all is included in it.

QUICK REVIEW: Watched the original Scarface last night, and I have to say it is a must-see for any movie fan, but particularly fans of the Pacino version. Going into it, I knew from reading articles about the movie that I should watch for the myriad of 'X's peppered throughout from director Howard Hawks, a reference to the title character's trademark scar. They were easy to spot, and some were pretty blatant (when he goes to kill an old friend, his room number is 'X' and he has a giant 'X' shadow on him), but there was one instance of it that was complete genius, which I had not read about. When Tony and his gang go to kill a rival Irish gangleader at a bowling alley, we see the Irishman shot just as he releases his ball, which results in a strike (for non-bowlers: that results in an 'X'). Thankfully, Hawks didn't have anyone write an 'X' on his scorecard or anything, he just left it at him bowling a strike. There are many parallels between this version and the re-make, most noticably the 'The World is Yours' sign, which is a key setpiece in both films. But the most memorable aspect of Scarface is the man himself, Paul Muni, a bad ass in every sense of the word and one of the original stereotypical gangsters of film.

Batman Began

One of the DVDs I got for Christmas was the excellent new 'Batman' disc. I already owned the regular release of it, but wanted the new one for two main reasons: the new transfer with a DTS track (the previous one looked horrible) and that they miraculously included all three of the videos Prince did for his Batman soundtrack songs. The latter reason would have warranted a DVD purchase on its own, two of the videos ('Batdance' and 'Partyman) have to be mentioned among the worst videos of all time. The song 'Batdance' is pretty much soundbites from the movie played over dance beats, the video isn't much better, with Prince dressed as half Batman/half Joker, surrounded by women dressed as Batman, Joker and Vickie Vale, it ends with Batman/Joker forced to pick up a shotgun that was lying on an electric chair, at which point he explodes. Make your own conclusions. The only noteworthy part of the 'Partyman' video (this is the song played as Joker and his goons mess up the museum) is at the beginning when Prince, again dressed as Batman/Joker, enters a party to the introduction of: 'There's a new king in town ... Partyman!'

Horrible 80s videos aside, the point of this post is to take a look at the first modern retelling of Batman, which was a major cultural event when it first came out. Batman was one of the first movies to feature an ends-all marketing campaign, complete with all kinds of product promotions and previews broadcasting all day and night. Of course, like many movies carrying such hype, 'Batman' disappointed most viewers, but not before making tons of money for Warner Bros. Yet for an impressionable 2nd grader, 'Batman' was a watershed moment. After I walked out of Lloyd Cinemas that fateful day, I began measuring my life from that day forward.

I loved the movie, had never seen anything like it, but couldn't believe how little my parents cared for it, as well as most critics. It was only until about five years ago when I first started seeing through my own prejudices to see why 'Batman' was such a failure.

I think the problem a lot of people had with 'Batman' in 1989 was that it was a wasted opportunity, because the Batman story is very film-friendly. His origin is dramatic and well-known, and there are built-in 'hey, cool' props such as the Bat Cave and Batmobile. Tim Burton succeeded on these points, but ultimately fell flat when trying to make the plot as modern as possible, throwing all the typical comic book storylines out the window.

Burton's attempt to portray the Joker as a maniacal artist trying to spread terror and erase vanity by poisoning beauty products doesn't just sound like a bad idea, it falls flat on screen, leading to the point near the climax where you go 'so what?' Maybe it was Burton's intention to go away from a 'can Batman save the world?' type story, but the way he goes about his watered-down plot never infuses any sense of danger, always vital to a comic book story.

Even without the flawed story, there are the scenes that bog down the movie just when it needs to get going. The absolute worst of these is the encounter between Bruce Wayne and Joker at Vickie Vale's apartment. On paper, I'm sure it was supposed to show Wayne as conflicted about his identity, since he wants to defend Vale but cannot reveal who he is. But what it amounts to is a very awkward scene with no real meaning, with lines such as 'You wanna get nuts, come on, let's get nuts!' Does that sound like something Bruce Wayne would say, much less while wielding a fireplace poker? The only memorable part of this awful scene is Kim Basinger's attempt at fainting in the very last shot.

Okay, so the story and some of the direction sucks, but you might be asking yourself at this point: 'Didn't this shlump just say he has TWO DVDs of this movie?' That's right, I do! I see more flaws with 'Batman' every time I see it, but that doesn't mean I don't enjoy it, just that I'm finally coming to terms with why it was so universally trashed in 1989. Danny Elfman's epic score is undoubtedly one of the biggest stars of the movie, same goes for Burton's images of Gotham City, which is just as stone cold and soul-less as Wayne is portrayed.

Christopher Nolan's sequel to Batman Begins is rumored to include the Joker, so it will be interesting to see how he updates the classic villain, compared to Burton's vision of him. Likely, the sequel to 'Begins' will push the 'original' modern retellings of Batman closer and closer to Whocaresville.

Thoughts on King Kong

It's sometimes painful to see the amount of remakes coming out of Hollywood now (Michael Mann, I love ya, but Miami Vice?), seemingly verifying the notion that creative thought is going down the drain. But in the case of King Kong, I am confident in saying that this is the best remake ever made (remade?). Not necessarily because of the special effects (more on them later), but because of the way Peter Jackson went about remaking his favorite movie. The core story is the same, there are scenes that are literally shot by shot (and sometimes line for line) the same, yet through all the parallels this is still a very different movie that was made the best way possible.

I loved it, but five years from now when I'm flipping through channels and Kiwi Pete's Kong is on TNT and the original Kong is on Turner Classic, I think I would choose the latter. The main reason I prefer the original is how Jackson has tried to make the relationship between Kong and Ann more mutual. In the original, the movie is mainly about Kong being a very lonesome beast who finds some kind of happiness in this strange flax-haired beauty who doesn't run away from him. We never see too much emotion (or anything other than screams) from Ann toward Kong, she's pretty much along for the ride. Jackson tries vainly to show that Ann cares for Kong, with unfortunate results most of the time.

Two scenes in particular illustrate this. As they're escaping the island, Ann tries to stop Denham and Co. from hurting or capturing the ape. Um, a few hours ago you were hanging from the lip of a T-Rex and were nearly eaten by a half dozen jungle creatures, are you really worrying what's going to happen to Kong at this point? Then at the end as the biplanes attack Kong on the Empire State Building, Ann tries to wave off the attackers. Why? What do you plan to do with Kong once they let him live in peace? Jackson never really sells the audience on why Ann would care so much for a 25-foot ape and as a result she often comes off as comically deranged. We can easily see why the beast would love the beauty, but why does the beauty want anything to do with her beast?

What impressed me the most was how much homage Jackson pays to the original Kong. Many scenes are recreated note for note, most surprising of which is the T-Rex battle, which uses the original's climax nearly verbatum. A few others, such as Jack's rescue of Ann and the entire Kong on Broadway sequence, are similarly recreated. In the hands of any other filmmaker, Kong would be throwing the T-Rex into a volcano, but it's a tip of the hat to Jackson who can use the original foundation to create scenes that still mezmerize.

And he is able to mezmerize the audience with the best special effects ever seen on screen. If you think you've been CGI'd to death after seeing any of the Star Wars prequels or even Jackson's Lord of the Ring trilogy, where you never forget you're looking at something digital, Kong will blow you away. Even upclose (which many of the shots are), there's no reason to believe you're not seeing a live 30-foot tall ape. Jackson and Co. must have done exhaustive primate research to make Kong move and act so lifelike. His lips and fur look like you could reach out and touch them, you never get that feeling with the aforementioned movies.

Is it too long? It comes in at 3 hours 7 mins, but I can only think of a few scenes he could have cut. Jackson essentially follows the same structure of the original, but obviously fleshed out the potential of Skull Island with more horrors. Skull Island is a truly terrifying place in 2005. The original natives wore coconut bras, now they're almost as scary as the creatures outside their walls. Jackson's Skull Island also has a welcomed mythical quality, with Mayan-style ruins peppering the landscape (complete with steps leading to Kong's perch). The only part of Skull Island where Jackson may reach too far is the bug pit, which has a scene in it that I think crosses the line and will cause many audience members to look away.

It cost over $200 million, but 'King Kong' lives up to the hype and would have conquered any summer challengers had it been released then. Universal has a license to print money with this film and it should earn Academny nominations for visual effects and sound editing. What I'm looking forward to now is what the DVD will be like, since the LOTR sets were appropriately over the top.

NOTE: The DVD Panache offices will be closed for Christmas vacation next week, but will re-open for business in January

A Kubrick Christmas

Some people watch It's a Wonderful Life or A Christmas Story during the holidays, I watch Eyes Wide Shut. Stanley Kubrick's last cinema offering before his death, 'Eyes Wide Shut' remains an enigma for film fans, with some hailing it a masterpiece while others condemn it as an uneven disappointment. But no matter what you think of the movie, you have to agree that it is a mysterious visual journey through the most difficult emotion in relationships: jealousy.

I get a dull look most of the times I tell people that this is one of my favorite movies. Like most Kubrick films, it warrants multiple viewings to understand the various themes and visual tricks the master filmmaker is trying to get across. Due to strange circumstances, I saw 'Eyes' on the big screen on three consecutive nights, so I had some time to digest it. I think the biggest problem for 'Eyes' detractors is that although it is set in New York, it is not structured, paced or written like most American films. Kubrick is famously anti-Hollywood and goes against its conventions whenever possible, 'Eyes' is a perfect example. Its structure is both frustrating and fascinating because even at the two hour mark, you really don't have a good idea of what direction it's going: does it turn into a straight mystery with Bill's experience at the mansion or was his two-night odyssey all a dream? Ultimately the most important plot devices happen at the very beginning and end, an atypical structure that can turn off many viewers.

In the beginning, our focus is on Bill (Tom Cruise), but our eyes should instead be turned to Alice (Nicole Kidman), whose character's revealing scene is taking place with her Hungarian suitor at the Christmas party. Alice lets him dance and shmooze with her through several songs, all the time quietly keeping up his hopes that he might have a chance at an affair with her. This is best illustrated when Alice is asked if she would like to go upstairs and see the art collection, to which she responds: 'Maaaaybeeee ...... nottt .... juuuuuusssst ...... yet.' It becomes clear that she is just toying with the emotions of her dance partner, keeping him on the edge of her finger until finally pushing him away. Upon first viewing, this scene may seem trivial, but it is absolutely vital to understanding Kidman's character (more on that later).

Meanwhile, husband Bill is face to face with a conked out hooker shortly after rebuffing the advances of two European models. Both Bill and Alice had the invitation to be unfaithful presented to them on a silver platter, with Alice seemingly energized by the experience while Bill treated it like an everyday occurrence. Alice's encounter with the Hungarian seems to be her motivation for instigating the bedroom battle of the sexes in the next scene. Alice is shocked at Bill's admittance that he is never jealous of her, which leads to Alice's disclosure of her near affair years earlier. This confession destroys Bill's stereotypical view of how women think, and the very idea that his wife could have been unfaithful lights a fire in him.

After Bill leaves the bedroom, he begins a journey to a destination he is unsure of, perhaps with the intentions of testing his own faithfulness. Along the way, every person he meets interacts with him sexually and in most cases stops short of throwing themselves at his feet. While Bill does not accept any of these offers, he comes tantalizingly close (especially with the hooker Domino and later her roommate), and in the end his 'only' crime is lying, which is treated by Kubrick as just as wrong as cheating.

These scenes all set up the final conversation, when we get the idea that Alice's sailor confession may not have been true (and we're unclear if Bill's adventures actually happened), but get the idea that Alice's plan to make her husband jealous and change his stereotypical view of women and sex may have worked too well. In the toy store, Alice experiences the same shocking emotions as Bill did in the bedroom, learning that their whole marriage could have been thrown away in seconds. They resolve to be 'awake' now, since the source of their troubles was mostly their respective imaginations.

What makes 'Eyes' truly a classic for me is the numerous 'winks' Kubrick throws at the viewer both with his lens and in the story. There are a couple of coincidences in 'Eyes' that still puzzle me, intended or not. The first is during Bill's early encounter with the models, they tell him they're going to take him 'where the rainbow ends,' and later Bill ends up at Rainbow Fashions to rent a costume. The second is at Domino's apartment, she refers to Alice on the phone as 'Mrs. Dr. Bill' and later at Victor's house he says that Nick is probably 'at home, banging Mrs. Nick.' I'm not sure what Kubrick is trying to say with these, but it seems like there's more there than just coincidence.

There are numerous visual tricks that Kubrick employs, the most paramount is his lighting. Kubrick was always known as a perfectionist with his lighting, and his lights in 'Eyes' probably deserve a credit alongside Cruse and Kidman. All the light sources in 'Eyes' seem just a little too bright, creating a unique style that reaches a peak at the early Christmas party scene when Cruise and Chris Isaak walk up a flight of stairs flanked by a wall of christmas lights that creates a wondrous contrast with their tuxedos. I can't imagine trying to watch this scene on VHS, or even how much more spectacular it will look in the next generation of DVD. Kubrick continues this over the top lighting technique throughout the running time, paying particular attention to having colored Christmas lights (and Christmas trees) in almost every scene.

The other visual trick Kubrick uses is the blue light that permeates through every window at night. This is first made apparent in the early bedroom fight, when Alice is in the doorway to another room, which is entirely bathed in blue light. This blue light could probably be explained in the city scenes, but where does it come from at the mansion? Kubrick could be trying to use blue (typically a color associated with sex) to illustrate the sins that await Bill and Alice outside their bedroom.

But I couldn't talk about 'Eyes' without discussing my favorite scene in it, which ranks among my favorite scenes of all-time. When Bill is at the mansion party, he is summoned downstairs, for a few seconds we see only see Bill staring at what awaits him on the main floor. Even before we are allowed to see what has startled him, the viewer is startled by a single piano note, which is the first note of the film's score played thus far (and this is roughly an hour and a half into the movie). The abrasive piano theme perfectly echoes the horrific scene Bill is seeing: the entire masked party waiting for him to be unmasked. Our first glimpse of the gathering of masked party guests staring at Bill (as well as the subsequent montage of masks) is a startling shot that conveys the fear Bill is feeling.

NOTES: At the 1:21:14 mark, a masked party guest walks into the room where Bill is with a girl at his side, the next shot shows her walking up to talk to Bill but if you look closely you can see that this is a different actress than the previous shot; it's been said before that the reason Bill was busted at the party was because he was wearing a blue cloak instead of a black one, I don't buy it: when he enters into the inner circle after being called out, you can see that it's more of an effect of the blue light hitting Bill's cloak because some of the guests behind him also appear to be wearing blue; Clues that Bill's nights could have been dreams: both nights he greets Alice just as she is waking up and the aforementioned coincidences (especially the rainbow reference) could be Bill dreaming about things that were said to him earlier.

The View From the Cheap Seats

So I don't get out to see new movies probably as much as I should, but on Saturday I was able to ingest two of this year's best that have long-overdue viewings for me: all for only $6. Yup, I went to the cheap theater to see A History of Violence, then as I walked out to my car, I realized that for another mere $3, I could see Wallace and Gromit in the Curse of the Were-Rabbit. Yes, you've probably already read reviews of these two long ago, but if you stick through my takes on them, I might even throw in a couple bonus reviews.

A History of Violence
The title of this wonderful film could easily apply to its director, David Cronenberg, whose work usually features grosser than you'd expect gore and frequently contains visions of flesh being transformed and manipulated to show what a person is truly made of (see Videodrome, eXistenZ, The Fly). But while those movies deal with excruciating changes and transformations, it's a little refreshing that the central theme of A History of Violence is that people do not change, no matter how hard they try.

Cronenberg isn't trying to say much with 'Violence,' which is why it may feel a little too simple and inconsequential to some. I think its perfect that way, Cronenberg takes an old fashioned approach to his movie, using a pacing and story typically found in 1940s detective noirs (Out of the Past is the most obvious parrallel).

'Violence' introduces us to Tom Stall (Viggo Mortensen), who has been trying his best for the past 20 years to be an ordinary guy, to forget his violent past. He owns a diner in a sleepy Indiana town and loves his wife and kids. But one night changes everything when his diner is held up by a couple of thugs. One of them utters a line that foreshadows an upcoming shot, when he shouts: 'Show them we mean business!' Before one of the thugs can assault a female employee, Tom quickly shoots and kills both of them. Before we leave the diner scene, we get a quick and biting shot of the thug Tom shot in the head, we see his fractured skull and how he's struggling through his last few breaths. It's a startling shot, but to me this is Cronenberg showing the audience 'he means business.'

Tom is soon visited by three men he pretends not to know, they are from his old gang in Philadelphia, they insist on calling him 'Joey' and ask why he hasn't talked to his brother for so long. The three (led by a brilliant Ed Harris) pester Tom's family before finally threatening to hurt them lest Tom returns to Philly. Tom can't keep up the charade any longer, and eventually heads to Philadelphia to confront his past.

Cronenberg never lets the audience doubt that Joey was once a very real, and violent criminal, but it's also realistic that Tom wants to leave Joey behind forever, no matter how many people he has to kill. I loved how Tom's killings in this movie are unflinchingly brutal and masterful. Joey may have changed his name to Tom and moved to the country, but he never forgot how to kill people.

Wallace and Gromit in the Curse of the Were-Rabbit
June 1997, I'm in the middle of a way too long Aer Lingus flight to Ireland, sitting in the very middle of the claustrophobic middle aisle of a 747. The only thing that saved me from pulling the 'eject' button on my seat was a mid-flight showing of some shorts featuring these curious characters named Wallace and Gromit. The shorts (especially The Wrong Trousers) had some of the best animated action scenes I had ever seen, the fact that it was in claymation made it even more amazing.

W&G has been popular in the U.S. for a number of years, but it would take a movie like this to really unleash it on the masses. Years in devleopment, Curse of the Were-Rabbit not only one-ups itself in the action department, but also contains enough puns to make Carrot Top keel over (wishful thinking). I think it's one of the top 5 movies of the year and one of the best family movies in years, so why didn't it 'only' gross $55 million domestically? I really think it was a mistake to release it at Halloween, because it's pretty far from a scary or even a monster movie, and Halloween releases typically don't make much. W&G should have been released a week before Thanksgiving, put head-to-head with the other family movies that fight for audiences during the holiday.

It's really that good. I was in a theater full of kids and found myself probably laughing more than any of the tikes I was surrounded by. What enhances its value is that kids today are so spoiled on the Pixar-type animated movies that its a treat to see pantheon-level clay work. Steve Park and Nick Box could have easily used CGI for some of the scenes, but thankfully didn't (it's used tactfully in one scene, but you can barely notice).


Bonus review: Rio Bravo
I had heard alot about this epic Howard Hawks-John Wayne collaboration, specifically how it was one of the best siege movies, in the same league in the genre as Zulu and The 300 Spartans. So because of this, I had the mindset going in that it was going to be non-stop action like those two, and it most certainly is not. I wouldn't even classify Rio Bravo as a siege movie, even in the Western siege subgenre that includes High Noon, rather I'd just call it my favorite traditional western (which excludes the likes of Peckinpah and Leone) period.

'Rio Bravo' is one of the few movies I've found myself liking more and more as I continue to look back on it. This could be due to its deliberate-as-mollasses pace, which will turn off anyone looking for quick action. Though it is slow going for most of the movie, 'Rio Bravo' is very hard not to like. You have Wayne being The Duke, Dean Martin being a (what else?) drunk gunfighter and of course Walter Brennan having free-rein to be the sass-mouth rube deputy with half a leg that only he can play.

The trio of Wayne, Martin and Brennan is pure gold, and they're a small Texas town's only hope to keep a rich rancher and his henchmen from tearing the place apart to spring his brother from jail. It's been said before, but Hawks went about to make an anti-High Noon and bloody well succeeded. Whereas Gary Cooper goes looking for help in every tavern and church to brace for the arrival of Frank, Wayne refuses to enlist help from the town and makes do with what he has (for the most part). From its infamous dialogue-free opening to shootout ending, 'Rio Bravo' is a relic of a western masterpiece that deserves patience and praise.

Super Quick Bonus Review: Family Guy Presents Stewie Griffin: The Untold Story
Finally saw this one and was very impressed. As big a fan as I am of 'Family Guy,' the one problem I have with it is its inconsistency, the jokes are either fall on the floor funny or a shake your head miss. I thought this would be exacerbated in the movie, but that is not the case, as it has some of the best writing of the whole series.

Though it doesn't have the feel of a full-length movie (it's pretty much three episodes, and it even has writing credits for three 'parts'), 'Stewie' will probably exceed any 'Family Guy' fan's expectations, and the 'Ferris Bueller' parody at the end is worth the price of admission alone.